5 Pitfalls of Employee Scheduling and How to Avoid Them
As a competitive business owner, you cannot afford to hang on to outdated employee scheduling practices. By updating outdated processes with modern compliance safeguards, analytics tools, and automated alerts, you can improve company morale, operational efficiency, and customer retention directly.
How many hours a week do your managers spend on employee scheduling, not to mention last-minute changes? If you’re like many employers, the answer is: too many. Furthermore, when it comes to employee scheduling, employers face a number of common pitfalls—costly, time-consuming errors they may not even be fully aware of.
However, for every problem, there’s a solution. For each of the five most common employee scheduling pitfalls, savvy employers can adopt proactive strategies that not only help them avoid missteps, but turn their scheduling practices into a company asset.
Learn more: 5 Reasons Your Business Needs a Workforce Scheduling Software
Pitfall #1: Holding onto Outdated Employee Scheduling Methods
Every minute that managers spend on employee scheduling is time that could be better spent actively managing their team. And when there’s a chronic need to make last-minute changes, that suggests the process itself may be flawed. Often, it’s because employers continue to rely on old-school manual scheduling—which is not only very time-consuming, but rife with potential for error.
In the last decade, tremendous advances have been made in employee scheduling software. However, it’s one component of HR technology that many employers have been especially slow to adopt. According to the Sierra Cedar 2018-2019 HR Systems Survey, while 90% of employers are now using time and attendance software, only 45% of them are also using scheduling software.
Yet powerful employee scheduling software allows managers to quickly build, edit, and update weekly work schedules. It can automatically flag inadvertently-scheduled overtime and effortlessly split job schedules for employees who work in dual capacities.
Furthermore, with scheduling software, workers can be categorized and labeled by their training and certifications, so that information is always sharable and accessible. As a result, it’s easier to make informed changes on-the-fly.
For example, should a particularly-certified worker call off when her manager is on vacation, another manager can swiftly identify a qualified sub—no digging around in the files. Today’s scheduling software helps employers avoid other key pitfalls as well.
Pitfall #2: Maintaining Unpredictable Employee Scheduling Practices
Studies show that fluctuating employee scheduling practices drive up turnover and drive down productivity. When employees can’t pay their bills or lock in childcare because of unstable work hours, they’re going to leave that job for one that’s more secure as soon as they can.
Unlike manual scheduling, scheduling software make it easy to create a fair, balanced distribution of work hours, so you’re less likely to have unhappy employers. And when workers can access and accept online schedules from their smartphones—another advantage of scheduling software—it eliminates the confusion that can result in missed shifts.
Furthermore, some scheduling software gives employees more active input over their schedules, such as the ability to swap shifts with coworkers and bid on open shifts—both very popular features with hourly workers. Beyond efficiency, adapting worker-friendly employee scheduling practices is an effective strategy for boosting morale and retention.
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Pitfall #3: Not Viewing Scheduling as a Budgeting Tool (Overtime, Anyone?)
Chances are, labor costs are already your single largest expense. Unfortunately, if your managers are casual or inconsistent in their employee scheduling practices, your labor costs are undoubtedly further inflated. With manual scheduling or spreadsheets, it’s difficult—verging on impossible—to calculate how any given schedule will impact your labor budget.
In contrast, some advanced scheduling software includes automated budget calculators that tally your costs for any proposed schedule—i.e., job costing. That makes it easy for managers to create schedules that work within the budget of a given shift or worksite. Plus, no unpleasant surprises at the end of each payroll period!
Do you spend too much on overtime? That’s preventable. Some scheduling software will flag or alert the user when a schedule-in-the-making generates unintended overtime hours. Considering that, 1.3 million more workers will become eligible for overtime on January 1, 2020—a result of the Department of Labor’s updated overtime threshold—now is the time to put strict overtime safeguards in place.
Pitfall #4: Failing to Utilize Employee Scheduling Analytics
How do you know if the schedules your managers create are resulting in productive, cost-effective workweeks? If you can’t track the outcomes, you don’t. While job costing is one way to measure the impact of your schedules, some scheduling software offers even more comprehensive analytics—generally when provided as part of a complete time and labor management solution.
For example, some integrated platforms allow you to overlay weekly schedules with employee time sheets, so you can see exactly what matches up and what (or who) has veered off the plan. Where are these deviations occurring? Who’s incurring unplanned overtime—and why? Do any related factors differentiate your top-performing work crews from the others?
In short, analytics hold the key to diagnosing and fixing flaws in your employee scheduling practices, which makes it’s puzzling that so many employers have been slow to adopt them—particularly those that operate on slim profit margins.
Pitfall #5: Ignoring Trending Fair Workweek Laws
Are fair workweek laws—aka predictive scheduling laws—on your radar? More cities and states are passing them. While the laws vary, their common purpose is to provide hourly workers with more stable, predictable work hours. Most laws require that employers give workers their schedules up to 14 days in advance, pay them for last-minute schedule changes, and offer them available shifts before hiring new employees.
Admittedly, fair workweek laws may not affect you right now. Currently, they’re limited to specific industries (i.e., retail, hospitality, food, and building services) and locations (i.e., Chicago, New York City, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Seattle and Oregon). However, they’re a sign of things to come. Some proposals have even been floated at the federal level. Sooner or later, they may come your way—so make sure you a system in place that will enable you to comply.
In summary, smart employers aren’t waiting to improve their employee scheduling practices. Updating inconsistent, old-school processes will save money and time, while improving morale and retention. The easiest way to upgrade: adopt advanced scheduling software.
Look for HR technology designed for your particular industry and workforce, and leverage the advantages of integrated workforce management software. Of all the challenges you face, this is an easy fix. In today’s competitive business environment, standing still means falling behind.
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